22-23 NBA Season Thread

[Digby]

1 hour ago, tBBP said:

- All that said, another thing many people don't pause to consider is that Kyrie, Kanye, Cannon (& certain others) may only be speaking on certain individuals within the Jewish community, but sometimes their phraseology and many people's quickness to react without stopping to think for themselves leads many more to think they're talking about all Jews at large, which is highly unfortunate.

 

Kanye has very clearly gone fully into the deep end of bigotry and literally has not been targeting certain individuals, not sure how much more clear he needs to make it.

 

Kyrie can be difficult to understand insofar as he speaks like an AI trained on a first-semester college freshman who didn't do the reading for Philosophy class but did smoke too much weed. I sort of believe him saying he meant no offense and thinking he is "Omnist" because it fits in with his long-running pattern of changing his religion/spirituality when it suits him. (Another thing that was considered a third rail to criticize him over, that turns out hasn't ended well.) I also believe he is too brain-broken and lacking the self-awareness to recognize something like the hardest of hardcore fringes of Black Israelite teachings is, literally, harmful and anti-Semitic. So, here we are. I think there's been enough of a pattern of nobody ever holding Kyrie accountable for anything, first over dumb basketball stuff and then increasingly non-trivial non-basketball stuff. 

 

Also there's been a whole lot of re-mainstreaming of anti-Semitism lately -- let's say since 2017 somewhere in Virginia or so without any black people around -- that didn't start with Kanye West's bad tweets three weeks ago. Probably also a factor in the whole conversation. 

 

 

[Digby]

22 hours ago, DG_ThenNowForever said:

 

Yeah, he's definitely crossed the line.

 

I also think that anti-Semitism among NBA players is a rock you have to be careful about turning over, because you're going to see probably a lot more than you want to. Kyrie probably feels emboldened in part because he's likely far from the only one to share those beliefs.

 

Probably true, but the NBA has spent years presenting itself as the more enlightened, justice-minded version of pro sports. Can't pick and choose now. Regrettable that the franchise at the center of this situation is located 10 blocks from Crown Heights.

 

And it doubles down on the bad timing when the league that wants credit for keeping the WNBA afloat will also constantly, performatively interview-and-not-hire women for head coaching jobs but will give one to the guy who was :censored:ing a subordinate in his office before he's even served his punishment. Wasn't Tsai the one who got in trouble for letting his WNBA team charter flights too much, too? I guess at least he's clear about working for competition and not morals there.

 

Anyway, back to your point:

 

 

[DG_ThenNowForever]

The NBA might be on its way to a season from hell.

 

Wonder what Stern would have done?

[BBTV]

Someone said this was the tip of the iceberg.  That's probably correct.  We're only two years removed from Desean Jackson (thinking he was) quoting Hitler on Instagram and doing the whole "anyone who thinks I'm anti-Semitic is taking it the wrong way."  Some really good posts on the topic by Ice Cap, DG, Buc, Admiral, etc.  Not going to get into the topic too much because it does toe the blurry line, but I appreciate the insights provided by those posters. 

 

Link to the Desean article which includes the initial post, incase anyone forgot.  

 

https://www.phillyvoice.com/eagles-desean-jackson-anti-semitic-instagram-farrakhan-hitler-quotes/

[IceCap]

3 hours ago, tBBP said:

- Kylie, Kanye, and Nick do not speak for all Black Americans (any more than Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson fo, which is to say...they don't.) Let's get that out the way right now, as a precursor to the next statement: be careful about using broadstroke  blanket phrases such as "Black antisemitism" which semantically implies 100% participation. Not all blacks think that same way. 

I didn't mean for it to come off in that way. When I say "white antisemitism" I'm referring to white neo-Nazis and other white supremacists who traffic in antisemitic beliefs. It's not an implication that all white people share those beliefs. 

 

The reason I used the term "Black antisemitism" is because antisemitism from Black folks tends to manifest in different ways. Antisemitism, regardless of where it comes from, has common elements but white and Black antisemitism, to me anyway, are distinct as a result of a number of factors. So it becomes prudent to differentiate. 

 

Regardless, I didn't mean to imply that antisemitism was universal or widespread among Black Americans. And I apologize if I implied that. 

 

3 hours ago, tBBP said:

- Mike's point about the conflation of "Jewish" and Black identity is valid and true. I airquoted "Jewish" for good reason, and it's nothing against the Jews, but it does tie into what Mike wrote about the BHIs: most don't even understand the difference between "Hebrew" and "Jew". Historically speaking, all Jews were Hebrews...but not all Hebrews were Jews. The Jews descended from Judah, one of the twelve (really thirteen) tribes of Israel (Jacob), who himself was Hebrew. So there's that. And the basis of this conflation? Slavery...the history of the enslaved Hebrews in Egypt and prophecies of future enslavement--which the BHIs have equated to the period of slavery here in the States. There's more to that, but I don't care to get into it here plus I don't even subscribe to all that stuff anyway. I think for myself.

I think for me... it's weird. Because I get it. African slaves in the Americas had Christianity foisted onto them and, through that process, they discovered the Exodus narrative. And the story of a people in slavery who received their freedom resonated with them. I get it. 

 

But the attempts to take that a step further and claim that they are the true Jews or Hebrews or whatever...

 

... it just bothers me as a Jewish person because it's a case of someone else coming in and co-opting my religious and ethnic identity and claiming it for themselves. And in a world where a white girl wearing dreads or a white guy claiming Native ancestry because he's 1/8 Sioux gets called down as cultural appropriation... that's what this feels to me. 

 

Again, I understand why African slaves who discovered the Exodus story felt that connection, but when Black folks try to insist that Jewish heritage is really their heritage... well that's no good. 

 

Especially when it then leads to cases like this where Kyrie starts denying the Holocaust, and then has to walk it back by describing it as if his dog took a crap on his neighbour's lawn. 

 

3 hours ago, tBBP said:

All that said, another thing many people don't pause to consider is that Kyrie, Kanye, Cannon (& certain others) may only be speaking on certain individuals within the Jewish community, but sometimes their phraseology and many people's quickness to react without stopping to think for themselves leads many more to think they're talking about all Jews at large, which is highly unfortunate. That that never gets checked in/by the media greatly perturbs me. (And trust me, as a Black man in this country, I know a thing or two about being unfairly generalized with a whole group based on the actions of just a few of that group.)

The only thing I'll say to this is that my boss is Black. He's mostly a cool guy but work's work and sometimes he gets on my nerves or he passes along an edict I don't agree with but have to comply with because that's how life works. 

And maybe if I'm in a really bad mood I might :censored: about him. But in my six years at this job I've never let even a momentary frustration with him turn into a rant about Black people or an excuse to disparage all Black people.

 

So if Kanye West, Kyrie Irving, Nick Cannon, or any other Black person has a problem with a Jewish person... maybe they need to deal with that business personally and not disparage an entire religion and ethnic group. 

 

3 hours ago, tBBP said:

Lastly, and I'll land this plane here, this is my appeal to anyone who will listen: don't be so quick to broadstroke and/or generalize, or draw conclusions without making an effort to understand root factors/causes. And think about what you're thinking about and ESPECIALLY what you say and how you say it, especially in this highly sensitized day and age. There's a way to say anything tactfully that doesn't make the truth any less true, if it is true. But that's why we people got to learn to research stuff, and think, for ourselves. 

I'm trying man, I really am. Hence the exploration of the identification of Black identity with Exodus and how that segued into Jewish identity. 

 

At the same time I grew up in a world where we thought the antisemitism of the past was just that, the past. Most of my friends went to Church, I went to Synagogue, no one thought much of it.

 

But then Charlottesville happened. Then a slew of shootings at synagogues happened. I went to Yom Kippur services this year. I had to go through a metal detector. That's ed up. 

 

And now I see rather prominent and outspoken figures in the Black community actively spreading antisemitic talking points. Like... you'd be justifiably worried if Tom Brady and  Thom York started spreading racist ideology about Blacks and a bunch of other white people were publicly agreeing. 

 

Well that's how it is as a Jew seeing this crap go down. 
 

So I'm worried for myself, and the safety and well being of my community. I'm hoping I don't attack anyone unfairly. The kicker is I expect the same in return and likely won't get it. 

[Indigo]

A few points here:

1. Americans as a whole have a particularly disheartening habit of generalizing a group based on the actions of a loud few.  
2. @Digby made a good point about how antisemitism has been resurfacing for awhile now, but the world had been metaphorically set on fire since then, so that got swept under the rug in most people's minds. To pin this becoming mainstream on Kanye is rather unfair, but him and Irving do need to be held accountable for continuing to spread these types of messages.
3. I sympathize with @IceCap, because as a Black person myself, I understand how it feels to both have someone attack your entire ethnic group over an issue with one person, and how it feels to have part of your culture essentially "stolen" and identified by a group of peole who have no buisness doing so. Black people have first-hand experience with these kinds of things, which is why I'm even more dissapointed in Kyrie, Kanye and Nick, because to put it plainly, they should know better.
4. I think we are approaching a dark time in American history, one where we essentially undo all of the progress that has been made in the last 100 years or so, from women's rights to African-American's rights to antisemitism and so on. All of the issues that people raised hell about and finally started to see some progress is unravelling rather quickly.

[Digby]

4 hours ago, DG_ThenNowForever said:

The NBA might be on its way to a season from hell.

Jalen Rose already had to make a public apology on ESPN tonight and we’re only at halftime of the first game, so yeah, probably.

[TrueYankee26]

1 hour ago, Digby said:

Jalen Rose already had to make a public apology on ESPN tonight and we’re only at halftime of the first game, so yeah, probably.

[TrueYankee26]

If/when ESPN does a 30 for 30 on the KD/Kyrie era of the Brooklyn Nets, they could spend a couple episodes on the calendar year 2022 alone lol.

[MJWalker45]

1 hour ago, TrueYankee26 said:

Glad to see he apologized, but I'm pretty certain most HR training would have already explained to him why her name wouldn't be put out. Everyone else in the organization probably knows her name, there's no reason for everyone else to.

[Discrim]

In a breather from the Kyrie melodrama, the Bucks remain the last undefeated team, are 8-0 for the first time in team history, triple double for Giannis, and this Beauchamp kid looks pretty solid

Not enamored with the late start, not gonna lie, it's Minnesota, not LA.

[DoctorWhom]

Cavs also a surprise team so far. 

I know people thought they'd improve, but I doubt people had them being 7-1. 

[MJWalker45]

6 hours ago, DoctorWhom said:

Cavs also a surprise team so far. 

I know people thought they'd improve, but I doubt people had them being 7-1. 

They were in the 4 slot two months out from the playoffs until injuries helped them drop like a rock. Glad to see them playing so well right off the bat though. 

[TrueYankee26]

Also to add to the Kyrie discussion, Adam Silver is actually Jewish! I am surprised he waited that long to punish Kyrie.

[MJWalker45]

56 minutes ago, TrueYankee26 said:

Also to add to the Kyrie discussion, Adam Silver is actually Jewish! I am surprised he waited that long to punish Kyrie.

I'm guessing he wanted to see what the team would do first, which is why we didn't see the league step in when Boston suspended the coach for the season. The team suspending him at least 5 games may have been the league telling them they needed to do something behind the scenes, since they let this guy's vaccination status affect the league last year. 

[The_Admiral]

2 hours ago, TrueYankee26 said:

Also to add to the Kyrie discussion, Adam Silver is actually Jewish! I am surprised he waited that long to punish Kyrie.

If Silver had punished Kyrie instantly on that basis, aggrieved black people would be in even more of a state than they're in already.

 

Would this have happened under Stern? I don't think so. We talk about the "player empowerment era," but he wouldn't have let players feel so empowered that they can tell the world that Jews are unscrupulous shapeshifters who usurped the real Hebrews. No era is perfect.

[Digby]

Nets apparently changed their minds about Udoka and are keeping Jacque Vaughn as permanent(*) head coach. Interesting!

[floydnimrod]

I remember when Steve Nash was hired, Durant said something along the likes of Vaughn being the real head coach anyway (or his head coach or something like that). I figured this was only a matter of time.

[MJWalker45]

On 11/5/2022 at 11:01 AM, the admiral said:

If Silver had punished Kyrie instantly on that basis, aggrieved black people would be in even more of a state than they're in already.

All Silver had to do was point to expectations for how a professional basketball player should act.  If anyone pushed back on that point, Charles Barkley already called him (Irving) out for this lack of feeling/knowledge/false intelligence.  He is a conspiracy theorist with less polish than some of the bigger names that make their living preaching to the people who feel they are owed something. 

[who do you think]

7 hours ago, Digby said:

Nets apparently changed their minds about Udoka and are keeping Jacque Vaughn as permanent(*) head coach. Interesting!

 

How dare the Nets deprive us of that sh**tshow.

 

Also the Devil's Tritone Jazz are 10-3.